1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mobile communication terminal suitable for watching television thereon, and a mobile communication method and an information recording medium which make a mobile communication terminal suitable for watching television thereon.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, mobile communication terminals equipped with a function for receiving television programs broadcasted by digital terrestrial broadcasting have become popular. As television broadcasting for mobile communication terminals such as portable telephones, etc., particularly, digital broadcasting according to standards like ISDB-T (Integrated Services Digital Broadcasting-Terrestrial), DVB-H (Digital Video Broadcasting-Handheld), T-DMB (Terrestrial-Digital Media Broadcasting), etc. has been started, providing users with increasing opportunities for watching television broadcasts by using mobile communication terminals.
Such television broadcast reception by a mobile communication terminal has a merit that television broadcasts can be received while on the move. On the other hand, there is a demerit that it is hard to maintain a fine reception condition, because the reception condition changes due to the moves. That is, unlike a stationary television receiver, etc., a mobile communication terminal cannot sometime allow fine viewing, due to various factors such as fluctuations (fading) of the intensity of the received waves due to the moves, fluctuations of the intensity of the received waves due to geographical changes, multipath caused by reflections on the surrounding constructions, etc.
A mobile communication terminal has a function for data communication through a communication network, as its basic function. A method for solving the above-described problem, which involves the use of such a communication function, has been proposed. For example, Unexamined Japanese Patent Application KOKAI Publication No. 2001-298725 discloses a system in which, when a broadcast reception error occurs in a mobile communication terminal, a server connected to a communication network retransmits the packet data corresponding to the error portion in a predetermined block unit to complement the reception error and enable continued viewing.
However, according to the above-described conventional method, even in a case where there is only one error packet in a given block, the server retransmits the packet in the predetermined block unit, resulting in a poor communication efficiency. Further, in a case where a terminal requests the server to retransmit only error packets, the terminal might have to frequently make requests for the retransmission of the packets and frequently receive the packets, depending on the reception condition, also resulting in a poor communication efficiency. That is, since none of these methods can achieve a fine communication efficiency, it is difficult to obtain smooth reproduction with simultaneous complementing of error packets.